Musa Musayev elected mayor of Makhachkala

Musa Musayev has become the new elected mayor of Makhachkala.

"The deputies of the City Assembly of Makhachkala have elected the new mayor of the city. Musa Musayev won the majority of the votes," RIA Novosti cited the head of the City Council, Abdulmuslim Murtazaliev, as saying.

Musa Musayev was appointed the Makhachkala acting mayor on July 10th after the resignation of Magomed Suleymanov. Previously he held the post of Minister for Construction, Housing and Utilities of Dagestan.

A senior researcher at the Center for Regional Studies and Urbanistics of the Institute of Applied Economic Research of RANHiGS, Constantine Kazenin, told Vestnik Kavkaza that it's a good thing that there will be a permanent mayor of Makhachkala.

"The fact that the candidate became the mayor means that the administration of the head of Dagestan, Ramazan Abdulatipov, generally intends to control all the key points of the capital's life. I think that Musayev will be quite a managed figure to rule the region, more than those who headed the city after Amirov's arrest, the most controlled of those who led the city after Amirov," the expert noted.

"However, this raises the question of what resources the regional authorities have  to monitor and assume full responsibility for the situation in such a complex metropolis as Makhachkala. In addition, struggle for sources of rent in this city will probably continue after the approval of the new mayor​​," Constantine Kazenin concluded.

Professor of the Department of Political Science of the Russian policy of the Moscow State University, Magomed Omarov, in his turn, also said that the appointment of the mayor of Makhachkala should benefit the city on a permanent basis. "The situation, in which officials replace each other so often, is not very stable. Makhachkala is a very complex city, especially its relations with the authorities. So, of course, the appointment of the mayor will affect the Dagestani capital positively," Magomed Omarov noted.